1. Field of the Disclosure
This application generally relates to translation and other matters.
2. Background of the Disclosure
The computing power of hand-held (as well as wearable, implantable, and other) devices makes it possible to write programs of instructions for those devices that display information in various different ways. These can include text, drawings, still photos, animation, movies, and otherwise. Inclusion of text (or figures displaying text) can lead to the problem of a difference in meaning between what the programmer of the instructions intends that text to mean, and what the reader understands that text to mean. While this can occur for any written material, the problem is particularly acute when there is more than one (natural, human) language involved.
One known solution is to provide more than one variant of the text or figures displayed by the program (sometimes called an “application” or an “app”), such as an English version and a Spanish version. In such cases, the program could be written in a language most easily understood by the programmer, with values used by the program to display text or figures of meaning to the user. Some programs use a technique known as “localization”, in which a single program can provide text and figures in multiple languages, as well as settings that determine what language to display the text, is collected in a standardized data structure. These settings can be fixed by the programmer, fixed at an initialization time by the program, or alterable by users from time to time. Other programs simply embed the text or figures as fixed constants in the instruction code, which is initially easier for the programmer, but can lead to greater difficulty when modifying or expanding the program later.
It sometimes occurs that translation of a snippet of text from one language to another can be very difficult. Often, the process requires a skilled translator, which can be expensive. Some languages have grammatical irregularities or idioms, and some words in some languages can acquire idiomatic or slang meanings, that would elude nearly everyone except those who are designing or using the program. Similarly, some words can have distinct meanings in different contexts, or multiple words can have the same or very similar meanings, again depending on context. For a first example, the English word hot can have at least four different meanings: temperature of an object, spicy food, indication of the weather, sexual appeal, each represented by a different Spanish word. For a second example, the English word charge can refer to a bank charge, a cavalry charge, a criminal charge, or an electrical charge, among other possibilities. It is quite possible that, in another language, each of these meanings will have a different word to express it.
One known solution is for the programmer to provide a list of textual words or phrases for the translator to convert into the other language. While this method can generally achieve the purpose of substituting one word for another, or one phrase for another, it is subject to some drawbacks. For example, since the programmer often does not have a working knowledge of the target language, it can sometimes occur that small changes to the program result in substantial changes in meaning of the translated version, which is generally undesirable.
Despite all the effort that might be put into accuracy, it sometimes occurs that one or more of the translations of words and phrases used by the program are not accurate, do not have the proper shade of meaning, or have a secondary meaning (such as a slang meaning) that is inappropriate. Even a skilled translator might miss slang and off-color meanings that are used in a subset of the population of people who use that language. It also sometimes occurs that words or phrases change in meaning among the population of people who use that language, possibly unpredictably, and possibly over relatively short periods of time. At least some users of the program are likely to notice this, but there is no convenient way for those users to communicate this information back to the programmers who created, or are maintaining, the program.
Each of these examples, as well as other possible considerations, can cause difficulty in aspects of translating a program from one language to another (or even from one regional dialect of a language to another), no matter what type of computer that translation is for (that is, whether that program is operating on a mainframe, a minicomputer, a desktop computer, a laptop computer, a tablet computer or display, a handheld computer or portable media device or telephone, a wearable computing device, an implantable computing device, or otherwise).